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| DeWitt Henry |
DeWitt Henry Reminisces on the 45th Anniversary of Ploughshares Magazines
***Ploughshares Magazine, based at Emerson College, is a much lauded literary magazine that was founded at the Plough and Stars Pub in Cambridge, Mass. some 45 years ago. I asked DeWitt Henry, a founder of the said journal, to write a small memoir piece about his life and times with the magazine. I had Henry as a guest on my Poet to Poet: Writer to Writer show on Somerville Community Access TV, and as a visiting author at Endicott College where I direct the Visiting Author Series. Henry proved to be a fascinating conversationalist, full of anecdotes about the literary world in Cambridge in the 60s and 70s, and his own development as a writer and editor.--Doug Holder/Ibbetson Street Press /Somerville, Mass.
I’ve just received the fall issue of
PS, edited by Claire Messud and James Wood and marking 45 years of
publication. Meanwhile, I’m still savoring last spring’s issue,
edited by Alan Shapiro and Tom Sleigh, not to mention the series of
“Solos,” begun by editor-in-chief, Ladette Randolph, three years
ago—long prose works first published in digital form then collected
annually in a print “Omnibus.”
Co-founding Ploughshares with Peter
O’Malley, in 1971, began the adventure (along with marriage,
parenting, and my own writing) of my youth, mid-life, and then some.
The original volunteer group met in the Plough and Stars pub, as
outsiders to what we thought of as the literary establishment, namely
people who were paid for writing and editing. We believed in common
readers, especially those of our own generation, who would explore
the different aesthetics and passions we debated. Our mission was to
discover, showcase and cultivate “tomorrow’s classics today.”
In time, more and more writers and critics rallied to our cause and
helped to broaden our network, and to build our reputation and
readership. And some of the writers we discovered or published early
on have, in fact, continued to grow in career and their contributions
have become classics.
The idea of such a magazine, and
especially of its editorial democracy, has so far engaged three
generations of editors, writers, and readers, and led, if not to the
world we had dreamed of (where poetry, fiction, and non-fiction
would thrive outside of the mass-market system and where all readers
would respect the role of literary magazines), then to a world vastly
more hospitable to both emerging and established writers, one in
which they are served by many literary magazines, small presses,
reading series, writing programs, and institutions. The limitations
of commercial publishing are better understood today, and with new
technologies (social media, the internet, blogs, digital and
on-demand publishing) and more independent presses, more writers than
ever seem to find audiences and sustain careers.
During my
twenty-four year tenure, Ploughshares grew from a local to a national
base and from print circulations of 1000 to 3000. Support from grants
gave us operating capital, which I turned into renewable earnings,
enough so to start paying staff. The workload outgrew volunteerism.
We found office space and support at Emerson College, which was
starting an MFA program and where I had been hired full-time; and
when I became chair of the writing department, I negotiated a
full-scale affiliation, making Ploughshares an Emerson publication in
1988. My teaching and administrative duties then pulled me away, and
I relied on our first MFA graduate , Don Lee, to manage the magazine.
He was a gifted writer and computer-savant , who had grown from
intern to Editor, who secured a major development grant from the
Readers’ Digest Foundation for promoting the magazine, and then
took over entirely in 1992, while I continued as an advisor. He ran
the magazine for the next 15 years, computerizing operations,
tripling our circulation by direct mail campaigns, broadening the
guest editor pool, and increasing Emerson’s support. In 2007,
having published his own story collection and first novel to critical
acclaim, he left to teach and write full-time (his fourth novel is
due next spring). I returned for an interim year-plus and led the
search that brought Ladette Randolph from the University of Nebraska
Press as our new editor-in-chief. For eight years so far, Ladette
has shaped and connected Ploughshares to new generations, new
readers, and an even wider community. I was proud to guest-edit the
40th anniversary issue at her invitation. She has also
flourished with her own writing: a story collection, two novels and a
memoir. If the past is prologue, I hope Ploughshares proves to be a
never-ending story.
I retired from teaching last winter in
order to write more. I’ve placed work recently in Brevity and the
Massachusetts Review and have work upcoming in the Wilderness House
Literary Review (I’m also rejected by other places I admire). My
two memoirs were published by small presses, Red Hen and Hidden River
Press. My writer’s website (www.dewitthenry.com)
has registered some 9000 hits. I’ve published my first story
collection, Falling: Six Stories, with Create Space.
Meanwhile, I send around my third memoir and a novel. I review books
I love. Would I start another magazine or press at this point? No.
It doesn’t seem as culturally necessary as it was in the 1970s, if
only because there are so many good ones. However, I have joined two
on-line magazines as a contributing editor: Solstice, edited by
novelist Lee Hope (www.solsticelitmag.org)
with a mission to promote diversity, and Woven Tale Press
(www.thewoventalepress.net)
edited by novelist Sandra Tyler and vested in showcasing graphic as
well as literary arts. I still have opinions. I still find writers
and writers find me. Literature is a living process and I am
passionate about “what I will not willingly let die.”